Courtesy of Justin Mohareb (mo’ hareb, mo’ problems, that’s what I always say), I found Sun Media’s wonderful expose on the world of ILLEGAL INTERNET DOWNLOADING. And who gets quoted more than anybody else in this series of articles? Why, Graham Henderson, of course, the head of the CRIA, which is like a Canadian version of the RIAA except it’s focused primarily on American record companies and their presence in Canada. (Go figure.) The Sun pieces do their best to portray Henderson as an aw-shucks simple guy who just wonders why we all can’t just get along. He’s of course actually a tool (in all senses of the word).

I particularly love this bit where he addresses the complaint about the cost of CDs.

Henderson counters that they also don’t cost nearly what they should. “We have always been beaten up over CD prices. The fact is that in 1963, you could buy a single for 50c. It had two songs and a plain white wrapper. These days, a CD single has three to four tracks, enhanced stuff, a jewel case, lyrics and on and on. That 50c in today’s dollars, with inflation, is $4.50. But that CD single costs $2 or $3. The price of music has never kept pace with inflation.”

My god, this argument is so disingenous I’m not sure where to begin…

Has anybody who reads this blog ever bought a CD single? The only time I’ve ever seen one for sale is when I was in the States on vacation and that was over a decade ago. They had a small shelf in the middle of a Strawberry’s that was ignored, because single sales on CD are a tiny percentage of the market compared to, you know, actual albums. Which, in 1963, cost about $3.50, or in 2007 dollars, about twenty-four bucks. Now, admittedly, a CD by a big-name artist has a list price nowadays costs about fourteen bucks, but that price adjustment has only come within the last year and a half. Remember twenty-dollar CDs? I sure as hell do. That’s one of the reasons I stopped buying them.

But what’s really making his argument reek of bullshit is that the griping about the cost of music has never been “it’s too expensive.” It’s always been “the profit margin is too high.” That fifty-cent vinyl single he mentions was made in the United States by well-paid labourers. CDs, on the other hand, are made by chain-ganged toddlers in China (or similar). They used to be expensive, which is why CDs used to cost twenty dollars a pop, because the cost to produce them was twelve to fifteen dollars. Then blank media costs plummeted and suddenly it cost a couple of bucks to make the CD, including all the artist’s costs and record company salaries and all that. But prices didn’t drop accordingly, and they still haven’t done so, and that’s why nobody gives a shit about record companies.

I mean, let’s be honest: the age of the record company, as we know it, is in its last days. All they can offer is promotion, which is not an inconsequential thing to artists, but they do so at exorbitant prices and with the frequent demand for unreasonable control. Nobody particularly cares about what happens to these vainglorious, parasitic middlemen. Which leads me to another bit of the article, where Henderson “debunks” the excuse of “well, your music sucks” that people use to justify downloading (or so he claims):

Those stories don’t stand up to scrutiny, claims Henderson. “We’ve asked Canadians: What was the last record you bought? Was it good? And people say that 75%-80% of the tracks on the record were good … So then you ask: Who is it that has the crappy records? And they say, ‘Oh, well, it’s people like Britney Spears.’ And when you ask if they bought those records, they say no. So what’s the problem then?”

Firstly, I’ve never heard anybody actually use this as an excuse, but never mind that.

Secondly, when people say “all the music sucks” and then say “Britney Spears,” when asked for an example, despite not owning any Britney Spears albums, you have to understand they’re not talking about Britney in the literal sense. They’re using her as a figurehead to describe the music business as a whole: the vapid marketing of manufactured teen-pop and Creed and rock bands that look good rather than sound good and Creed and gangsta rappers screaming about bitches and hos and Creed and “American Idol” and Creed and the immense, unspoken under-the-table financing that leads to robotized radio stations and Creed and the gradual stifling of original, independent musical talent and Creed and the rise of “child star” musicians with no discernible talent other than being cute and Creed and the co-option of every interesting new thing to come along by promoting lesser imitators of said interesting new thing and, most importantly, Creed.

They’re talking about the vast, banal landscape of modern music promotion. They just call it “Britney Spears” because she encompasses the worst of it all in one vapid, trashy little package. And you know that, Mr. Graham I Am A Big Shot Henderson, so kindly spare us the naivete.

I note, incidentally that Radiohead’s download-only, pay-what-you-want album – despite being of poorer quality than the eventual CD release, which everybody knew in advance – has racked up about $40 million in gross profit thus far with no end in sight, with an average price point of about five to six dollars. Now, admittedly, not every band is Radiohead, but then again not every band can be Radiohead. (And we should be thankful, because honestly, one Radiohead is enough. I’m looking at you, Coldplay!)

With costs of production dropping like everything else, let’s say I form a band with three other guys and build a bit of a local reputation with my fantastic bongo solos. Let’s then say that my band spends $10K on production for an Interwebs album release. (This is probably high.) We promote it, and go with pay-what-you-want… let’s say we get 100,000 downloads, and our average price point is seventy-five cents. After costs are knocked off, that’s $65,000 in profit split four ways, for $16,250 per band member. Now, this is not living the high life, to be sure, but nobody said art was inherently lucrative and that’s before you factor in other profit areas like performances.

Oh, and me and the band would actually own and control the rights to our own work. And that’s why record companies are headed the way of the dodo, and we’re seeing it happen right now, in real time, and I couldn’t be happier to see the fuckers on their way out.

And then there’s people in my situation, who prefer music that actually can’t be found anywhere under the domain of the RIAA and CRIA. But, hey, I can understand that – not everyone wants the same kind of music others like.
But I hate the idea that the RIAA might be eventually trying to sue me for downloading music that isn’t theirs.

Seriously, though, I can’t wait to see the record industry actually change…
…or, you know, curl up and die. I think I like that one better.

I’m not necessarily a Creed fan… honestly… But I also happen to be a graduate of the Royal Conservatory of Music (which, I think allows me to comment on music seeing as how I’ve dedicated my life to it) and as much as you’d like to pump your knowledge of the industry and thus gain credibility to comment on certain musical genres (i.e. modern rock, pop, top 40), you should really have a look at what you’re saying before you publish it. I’m sure based on what you’re writing (and this is TOTALLY a sweeping generalization) that you’re into the most obscure indie nonsense that exists and only consists of two chords and maybe a bridge… Again, this is an assumption. The reality of it is that Creed, as much as we dislike them because of their religious bent and so on and so forth, is an extremely talented group of musicians that write music that is the equivalent of enjoying a Chuck Klosterman novel. You may disagree, you may find it pretentious, you may even indulge in the guilty pleasure of the fact that it is catchy, but you’re also not breaking ground by letting the world know that you dislike it for fear of being part of the masses. At the end of the day, Creed plays their instruments and writes their songs and should not be lumped in with Britney Spears because you want to let the world know that you’re so different and original by hating a band that sold 30 million records. We get it. You probably hate Linkin Park too… wonderful… Please have something more intelligent to say next time instead of dropping the name of a group that broke up three years ago because you think it somehow contributes to your cred. You’re kicking a horse that is not only dead, but buried. In the meantime, why don’t we all pick the low-hanging fruit and talk about shitty the Backstreet Boys are… Dude… you’re weak…

Actually, I quite like Linkin Park and generally avoid indie-for-indie’s-sake. (I think “Faint” is one of the best videos ever made.) My argument that Creed are/were shit is based on me thinking they’re shit.

P.S. “On the other hand, if you think it’s one of the men, this argument will seem relatively trivial in comparison to your positive aids test.” Classy.

I always get a little suspicious when someone claims that they’ve ‘asked Canadians’. I’m Canadian, and no one’s ever asked my opinion…

Never bought a single. Not really a fan of listening to the same song rehashed three to four times over. And I never asked for all the (wonderfully censored) multimedia criap (sic) on the CD.

Who’s idea was that anyway? Can’t really drag the old IBM in the car with me when I go to work, which seems to be the case with some CDs these days.

Oh, by the way, is it illegal when I listen to a song on my car radio? Or when I get a CD from the local library? Yes, the owning organization paid for it, but I’m not (Just as someone had to buy that first CD to upload), nor are the potential thousands who also listen in. Have I, Mr. Henderson, failed in my duty? Or just stepped in yours?

The difference with the library and the car radio is that you’re not keeping a copy for yourself. The library is lending you the cd on the assumption you won’t burn a copy. Recording songs off the radio is technically illegal, if generally ignored since it’s hard to get a decent recording off the radio that can be illegally distributed.

However, illegal downloadings/illegal burning/illegal copying is not illegal simply when you distribute it. It’s illegal because you (or whoever is doing it) are possessing commercially-released work that you did not pay for.

It’s the same reason I don’t download scans of comics. At the end of the day, we’re beholden to our own conscience, but when a work is available commercially that I cannot access temporarily and legally (in a library, etc.) I feel irresponsible taking it illegally.

Such actions MAY spur purchasing habits (such as Mr. Bird’s, in the case of comics), but it still requires doing something morally dubious in my book. Situational ethics becomes a slippery slope, and I can’t help but think SOME people (and I not accusing anyone here) paint the media industries as evil simply because they don’t like paying for things and they want to justify their dubious actions. “I want it to be free,” so the people keeping it from being free are painted as enemies. Sort of like the tagger culture in Austin, Texas villfying the cops for preventing them from vandalizing state property.

Good point, honestly hadn’t occurred to me when I fired off my quasi-knee jerk response.

I guess what I was trying (and failing, looking back at the post I made) to articulate was the concern over how far groups like CRIA would go in ‘protecting’ copyright. Two greased up sides to every slope and all that.